What’s That Sound?
And will you marry me?
We keep a journal that houses all types of our adventures near and far. More like four journals. One page in one of them is designated as a sort of wish list of places we know we want to experience and check off along the way. At first we were real good about actually writing in real time to document and reflect. Even bullet points of key moments or funny things said by day’s end so they would not be forgotten. Several trips passed by as did all our good intentions and momentum of recording the crucial bits. Sure we had photographs but it wasn’t the same. We lost steam. Natasha and I were busy hiking, camping and making precious memories together for one year plus. So naturally as if on cue she shared a quote with me just the other day while sitting folding laundry from Jackie Kennedy which resonates now more than ever: “I want to live my life, not record it.” We felt instantly validated.
Now came time to break new ground. A backpacking trip seemed the natural progression. As we lie in bed conducting research and discussing possible destinations I began noticing an old familiar pattern. A review from 2014 mentioned an adolescent black bear sighting near such and such lake. Smiling across at Natasha I saw the trepidation loud and clear. Scratch that place off our list. Who knows how big and menacing that bear can get in four years? Lord only knows he/she has been posted up at that same spot all this time waiting. I know deep inside Natasha imagines cuddling the bear and hugging on that gigantic ball of fur throughout the duration. I am truly looking forward to one day telling that story. I also knew we would be choosing a different backpacking trip, one without the slightest mention of those salmon berry eating cutie pies.
And just like that we narrowed the field and selected a spot right outside Mt. Rainier National Park. “How about Sheep Lake and Sourdough Gap, baby?” showing me some beautiful vistas based off of her up to date keen trip reports sans black bears. “Let’s do it!” I said without the slightest hesitation all too happy to finally have a destination. The mere process of selecting our backpacking adventure left me wondering if we ever really were going backpacking. I needed this trip. We needed this trip. Unbeknownst to Natasha, very big things were in the works and everything was riding on getting outside.
We spent the majority of Thursday July 12th prepping. Our living room became ground zero. “How are we going to fit all this gear into there?” Natasha incredulously motioned toward two empty packs. Hardly any blank square feet of space remained as our entire adventure life lay before us, including the trowel, whistle and two growlers I just returned with from McClendon’s Hardware. More on that later. “First off we pack only mission essential items so we won’t be taking all this stuff” came my reply. It may sound gruff but I said it more in a soft reassuring manner to Natasha than I used to communicate with fellow soldiers the night before stepping off on some random forced march with a sixty pound ruck full of meticulously scrutinized and inspected packed equipment.
The trick became to secretively place the ring into my pack. Nothing doing! Natasha’s ring laid idle in my other pack in the garage for several months and now during the eleventh hour I couldn’t make a move. I was making all these frequent trips to the garage to pull crucial items out of our trailer to potentially make the cut for our packs and on one particular sortie I hadn’t grabbed what Natasha was looking for because I was desperately trying to seize hold of her ring and failed. I failed on all counts. Not only did I fail to retrieve the item requested I also fell flat on my face in terms of fruitlessly attempting to get my hands on her ring. By this point Natasha was questioning everything in the existence of the human race because when I returned empty handed with no clear answer as to why she was visibly disturbed. Here I am thinking all I want is to get her ring into my backpack and all she wanted was for me to grab the single serving doses of sun block. I was flat out empty handed and she was stark mad in disbelief. “What is going on?” she said with a quizzical glare. I had exactly no answers and that infuriated her even more. I will be god damned if I spill any beans at this point. I simply bit my tongue. And held fast and my own nerve from ruining the whole show. This operation just got real and I figured it out on the fly. To get her ring into my pack would require her sound sleep.
Friday the thirteenth of July would be the day. I set my alarm for 0300 hours. She’d be sound asleep and I could operate with impunity. I couldn’t sleep anyways. Too damn excited, I imagined all those stars we’d gaze at countless times before on my ceiling. I was merely breathing to get out of bed, get into my garage and get Natasha’s ring into my pack without her knowledge. It went down without a hitch. The alarm rang, I stopped the alarm and instantly sprang into action without a moment’s pause. I bounded down the stairs, made entry into our garage and snatched the very symbol of our love. I had only laid eyes on the ring two times prior although it had resided in my pack since 26 March. The third time I’d see it I’d be asking Natasha to marry me on top of a mountain later that afternoon. For now I was only all too happy to shove the box into a pair of socks in the bottom of my pack unimpeded. Let her sleep. Let her dream.
The coffee was set for 5 am. Our packs were, well, packed. I had managed to get the thing done. Now I anxiously awaited Natasha to rise and greet the day. I presented her with a card. It has become tradition. Every time we venture off together I give her my heartfelt words. Sweet, sweet sentiments of our purposeful life. We’d be getting an early start and so I made sure the tank was full in the truck and all the little odds and ends were fulfilled before we set out. This was new and exciting territory for us. The great unknown. We would power down Interstate 5 South until we were within Rainier range. A few tertiary roads later and we’d soon be setting off on the adventure of our lives.
Mind you there were several hiccups along our way. For starters, once we finally arrived to Sheep Lake trailhead we felt compelled to circle back twice in attempts to attain the apparently illusive hiker’s pass permitting us to even legally be there. “If we are going to do this I want to do it right” came Natasha’s exclamation. She looked beyond pissed. On our second round trip to obtain the pass she first became anxious, then perturbed and then straight up ready to go home. “Let’s just try” came my calm reassuring refrain. It was still early in the day, say 10:00 or 10:30 am, and I refused to throw in the towel so early and return home as Natasha had already intimated. I was ever determined to see this day done right. I must have some ray of hope on my side. The mood in the truck was too gloomy despite the sun shining bright and that is always a good sign. Our predicament would soon change. After doing all we could in meeting with a Mt. Rainier National Park ranger at some check point our minds were clear. “We’ve done all we can and my mind is clear” I boldly told Natasha in turning the truck around and making our final approach to our destiny.
The step off was the thing. Bearing down the side of a mountain with anywhere from 35 to 40 pounds on your back takes some getting used to. There need be a certain grace period to allow for proper acclimation and adjustment. Natasha had never done it and it had been 15+ years since I humped any substantial weight under the employ of Uncle Sam.
We quickly shed our light jackets eight minutes in. The sunshine combined with our exertions necessitated this action. A couple swigs of water each and we were off again. And that is when it started. I wanted my countenance to show cool, calm and collected but we both heard it. “What was that sound?” questioned Natasha eagerly needing reassurance. “Is it coming from the fuel cans in your backpack?” was her follow-up requiring an immediate explanation. She absolutely hates it when I fail to respond with words. I scanned a full three hundred sixty, head on a swivel, looking for the tiniest hint of movement. Nothing save that sound. I was jogging my brain then opening my mouth trying to explain it away. “Baby, it’s the gas canisters in my pack swooshing around and that is it.” I swung my entire body one hundred and eighty degrees to the left and back again to illustrate her hypothesis. I am pretty sure at this crucial phase of our adventure we were really only kidding ourselves. Somehow someway Natasha innately knew otherwise. Something other than the fuel cans in my pack was making that “whooomp whooomp whooomp whoomp” sound and she was instantaneously convinced we were prey. Natasha’s worst outdoor fear evidently befell us at the precise moment I was gearing up to see us reach the top of Sourdough Gap. More determined than ever before to see this day culminate with a resounding “YES!” at the top of this mountain, I quickly found myself sprinting just to catch up and keep pace with her. Right hand white knuckling her bear spray up, ready and targeting down range, Natasha was moving at a clip a good fifteen yards ahead of me showing absolute zero signs of slowing.
The trail itself proved arduous enough during peaceful and serene conditions. Narrow at points, rocky, steep and speckled with loose scree at others, combine that with the ominous sounds seeping in from the trees and we’d be lucky not to misstep and go tumbling down the mountain. Natasha, moving at breakneck speeds, showed zero signs of waning and now I sincerely began to redouble my efforts in ensuring her we’d make camp one and a half miles in. She needed answers. She needed clarity. She required the kind of reassurance we weren’t going to die, we were actually, if all the things went according to my plans, going to get engaged. “Everything is going to be fine once we make Sheep Lake, you’ll see.”
A hectic jaunt under sunny clear blue skies and forty five minutes later we finally arrived at the lake and what would prove to be an ideal spot from which to construct our base camp for this adventure. The incongruent nature of it all was perplexing. Here we were to have the time of our lives and within the span of a single hour the stress and anxiety consumed us more so than did the lone grizzly in Washington state. Camp was a well-shaded area overlooking the lake. A couple of trees in close proximity would make our hammock time idyllic with those breathtaking vistas. What we needed was a reset. Unsaddling our heavy loads, we took our collective breaths and sighed with a slight tinge of relief. We weren’t out of the woods quite yet. What exactly was all those tufts of fur near our campsite? Evidently we had decided upon Bear Town’s central plaza to pitch our tent. We needed to lunch, drink a couple of cold beers from one of our growlers and breathe. Taking necessary precautions, I took both growlers, our bear barrel with the foodstuffs, and the ring I managed to snag out from the bottom of my pack and made my way some fifty yards off to stash it all by this pretty creek. It was there I discovered the truth. All moss was not in fact gray as I presumed it to be growing up in the south. Looking up into the trees it was everywhere. We had taken it on blind fright not faith how all those innumerable wisps of hair belonged to none other than our salmon berry eating nemesis.
I looked over my shoulder figuring she’d be meticulously watching my every move. She wasn’t. Natasha had been in her own world, probably coming down from the realization she had not been viciously attacked by a bear. Perhaps she would indeed see Madeline again after all. Meanwhile, hands full of grass in my clutches, I was fashioning her grass ring. That is the beauty of Natasha: long ago she had vowed to marry me with nothing more than a grass ring. A twist was in the works. But in which order? I had struggled with that far too long. Time will tell.
We lunched on Turkey and Havarti sandwiches, drank a growler full of beer between the two of us and gazed out at Sheep Lake from an ideal base camp. Our tent was pitched replete with all necessary creature comforts, hammock strung seemingly in utopia and our views could scarcely be beat. I could see it clearly in her cool blue eyes. By all accounts, Natasha would have been heart’s content simply staying put considering all we just endured. Nothing doing! “Let’s make Sourdough Gap while it’s still early,” I proclaimed. Being ever careful in policing all the foodstuffs debris, we meticulously swept up and made our way up, up, up the mountain.
The eagle practically gave it all away. Here we are in this perfectly gorgeous setting making our way up this virtual Eden and we spy an American Bald Eagle directly overhead circling as eagles are apt to do. I instantly took it as a sign all was right in our world. You see dear reader, the eagle just so happens to be Natasha’s spirit animal and I wasn’t about to let this pass me by. Together, we made it to the very top and the vistas were absolutely sweeping and breathtaking. We were facing south toward Oregon and could see other mountain tops as well not including the summit of Rainier off to our right. It was all too much for the senses. I looked Natasha directly in her eyes, took her hands and then took one last glance behind me, hoping she was seeing everything I was seeing in terms of all that is beautiful in this world. Completely and utterly alone on the top of that mountain at that exact fixed moment in time I grabbed Natasha’s cell phone out of her hand and set it upon the ground while simultaneously taking a knee. I rehearsed the exact four lines I’d recite to her the precise moment I’d ask her to marry me infinite times. The ring box had been protruding from my right front pocket throughout the entire ascent. Let it breathe Jon, allow it to be free and shine before all. I had talked to my dad just the day before on the truck drive home from dropping Matt off at the airport. “Son, I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” came my father’s reassuring tones once I had told him my intentions.
Now came time to act. I was on that mountain with my love, my very life and I needed to simply take her by the hand, look her in those gorgeous blue eyes, and simply recite the four lines I had seared on my brain. For starters I got turned around. I immediately made for her right hand as I produced that gigantic ring box from my pocket, the same one I was convinced she had seen countless occasions before actually producing it. Natasha corrected me and I fumbled to slide it on the correct left ring finger whilst reciting my lines and looking into her eyes. Her eyes and her entire face were revealing everything I needed to know. She had been taken completely by surprise and was not believing what was transpiring. I had no sooner gotten through my lines when she requested I say them again. I like to imagine Natasha wanting to hold onto the words. Perhaps to know in her heart what she was hearing was actually real. The man kneeling before her wanting to marry her for exactly her.
Absolutely beaming before me, Natasha resoundingly responded YES! I shot up, took her in my arms and lovingly embraced her harder than ever before. I kissed, hugged, and held her close. Now to snap off a few mountaintop selfies, take in the views one last time, and head back down to the lake. Basking in all of it, we made it down the mountain as if floating. I remind you it was an absolute perfect day weather wise et. al. But was it really?
What a turn of events. Not two hours previous I had harbored serious doubts any of this would go down. My previous and initial attempt at asking Natasha to marry me resulted in her in the Emergency Room at Virginia Mason in Seattle, Washington the first week of June. Now it was real. We were getting married and it was everything.
Never mind our campsite was overrun with mosquitoes. Our futile attempts at staving off their unrelenting bites by hiding in our hammock was sort of funny looking back. Who knew they’d do all the damage? Couple that nuisance with the frat party emerging on the right bank of the lake and we had some decisions to make. It took us all of twelve minutes. We were packed up and heading back down range.
The fresh kill was alarming. Off to my left ahead of the trail I saw what appeared a deer that had seen better days. I warned Natasha and yet we lingered. We did everything the books tell you not to. Chances are a mountain lion had recently taken this fawn down and was most assuredly contending with us for the rights to this carcass. Here we were simply jaw-dropping at what exactly we were seeing having no clue as to the threat which fell this poor woodland creature. Oblivious to all the danger we were actually in, we stood there mourning the loss. We finally made our way back to the truck and it was there we knew we’d make it out aces. It wasn’t until much after we did the research and actually realized it could have been all for not.
We’d spend our engagement dinner in a parking lot in Auburn on Pizza Hut pizza and felt lucky to escape with our lives. That part of town proved sketchy to say the least. The pizza was hot and our collective heightened senses of alertness were even hotter considering.
The ring flew off her hand and directly into the bowels of the truck. Natasha had been futzing with this new addition on her hand all drive down, I couldn’t possibly blame her, and by the time we made South Center it happened to pop right off of her finger and literally into the truck. “Let’s just pull off the road Baby Bird, we’ll find it,” came my compassionate response. Inwardly, I was reeling. “We’ll tear this fucking truck apart,” was what I heard Natasha say as I pulled into some random parking spot in the mall. It just so happened it took all of one minute to adjust the seat, look underneath and there it was. No worse for the wear, we both jumped back into our appropriate seats and made our way back home.
Natasha had pointed them out to me the very second she had undressed. All counting, there were some two hundred plus mosquito bites which all appeared as huge half dollar size welts on her person and I figured we’d be visiting the emergency room that very evening. She agreed if they weren’t any better come Saturday morning we’d make the necessary arrangements. Painstakingly we held each other as we drifted off to sleep and awoke the following morning to Natasha’s body a tad bit better than it had been the night before. I dashed to Walgreens to procure all the calamine lotion and Benadryl essential to my baby’s recovery. I did not even pause in moving farther along to QFC to lay hands on a bottle of Veuve to celebrate the wondrous and momentous occasion of our engagement. Natasha’s body was actively shutting down on her. Relief was needed and how. After forty-five minutes of errands I returned to a fiancee in need of hands on treatment. The welts weren’t dissipating enough to make anyone feel more assured and with that I rushed in, cotton balls in hand,to help soothe all the negativity. “You really do love me,” was all she could say as I meticulously splotched lotion on roughly seven- eighths of her body’s surface.
It wasn’t how we’d envisioned spending our engagement weekend yet it was ours. I wouldn’t change a thing. It proved all the love and all the adventure.
